da betway： There’s probably only one player in footballing history who has an entire position named after him.
da betsson： But given his celebrity and the fact that he is so widely held up as the greatest defensive midfielder of his time, Claude Makelele is still arguably a criminally underrated player.
How, though, can you be underrated if there is an entire position named after you? How can you have changed the entire tactical makeup of the English game, steering the Premier League away from 4-4-2 formations to a new era of three-man midfields, and still be thought of in less glowing terms than you should be?
But Makelele is because he’s known for being the first man to have played the anchor role in midfield, the implication being that all that particular type of defensive midfielder is there for is breaking up the play.
There’s a suggestion that almost anyone with good tackling ability could do the role and that players who excel in it are somehow limited. And in the modern game, over a decade since Makelele came to England to play for Chelsea, the drive for efficiency and the need for players to do more than just one thing on the pitch, there is also a widely held belief that the Makelele role is doomed to extinction.
The theory goes that there is a new breed of defensive midfielder in the mould of N’Golo Kante. One who doesn’t just sit in front of the midfield, but who scurries around, tidying up behind the more attacking central midfielders, but also getting forward when necessary to help out the attack and recycle possession when attacking.
These players are useful in formations other than those with three-man midfields, it is said. They have the stamina and the pace to get back to stop counter attacks, and they can also help out in attack, and so they are perfect in two-man midfields, too. Especially 3-4-3 formations, where three central defenders give a more solid platform behind the midfield, but who also need some sort of protection from the defensive midfielder. The back three takes some of the load off the Kante-type figure, and last season that must have helped the Chelsea midfield greatly.
But whilst there do seem to be great differences between Kante and his ilk and Makelele a decade ago, there are oddly similar prejudices.
For one thing, Makelele is known as a player with a limited passing range, the sort of player who is only there to make up for the defensive shortcomings of others, but who gives nothing else to the team. And whilst this is truly harsh on the Frenchman at the base of Mourinho’s midfield, it might be quite true for others plonked into the role for other teams who adopted the fashion around the same time.
Makelele, though, wasn’t that terrible a footballer. He played for Real Madrid before Chelsea, though not in the same role. His defensive abilities were noted, of course, and helpful to the team, but he was a box-to-box player who gave attacking energy to his team as well as in defence.
The same thing is said, sometimes, of N’Golo Kante. The one biggest criticism you’ll see of the current Chelsea defensive midfielder is that his passing could improve. His ability at scurrying around the midfield, winning possession and giving it on to a teammate is so strong that it means Kante is often seen as just that and nothing more. And that’s probably unfair, too.
And this probably all comes from the fact that we still see defensive capabilities as reductive. That players can’t have qualities which help in both parts of the game. Full-backs these days are often categorised into attacking ones (who are often criticised for their defensive positioning and tackling) and defensive ones (who aren’t seen as sexy enough or skillful enough). The same is largely true of defensive midfielders, whose defensive qualities often overshadow some helpful other attributes.
When Kante came into the Premier League with Leicester City, Claudio Ranieri wanted to play him on the left of a midfield four, or in an attacking midfield role, not as a defensive anchorman. It was his athleticism, pace and stamina which made him seem so suited for that role. In reality, that was better put to use in the midfield, where he seemed to do the job of two men, taking the pressure off Danny Drinkwater.
Interestingly, it was Ranieri who signed Makelele for Chelsea, and declared he would be the ‘new battery’ in his ‘fantastic watch’. He didn’t describe his new signing in terms of stopping the opposition, or reducing him to defensive abilities. He described Makelele as a player who would bring energy to the team, not just stand in front of the back four and make tackles.
And whilst the same thing may well happen all over again with N’Golo Kante, Idrissa Gueye and others whose primary functions aren’t solely attacking or defending in nature, it does give an insight into why Makelele, despite the fact he is so celebrated as to have an entire position named after him, is underrated by most of football. Despite everything, he’s still a far, far better footballer than most people give him credit for – especially when they think they’re praising him.